by Lynne Graham
Her body tingled, nerve-endings uncurling in anticipation, heart rate speeding up. It was just sex, and she regularly told herself that fact. But she still had to acclimatise to the magnetic draw of wanting to rip his clothes off every time she saw him.
With an impatient sound he scooped up the heap of newspapers on her lap. ‘Haven’t you learned yet? You don’t ever read your own publicity. I pay my lawyers to read it for me,’ he confided, discarding the tumbled, crackling newspaper sheets in an untidy heap on the carpet. ‘I did appreciate the Dr Dazzler line, but not the wild-child tag. Someone’s confused you with your sister Susie, and an official apology will be appearing this week.’
Her full lower lip had parted from the upper. ‘Are you saying you’ve complained?’
Aristandros shrugged and removed his jacket, pitching it on to the ottoman by the wall and removing his shoes. Smouldering dark-golden eyes assailed her as he straightened to his full six-foot-three-inches of height. ‘I’m still convinced that you’ve only ever been a wild-child with me.’
‘Well, you’d be wrong.’
‘You’re all talk and no action,’ Aristandros quipped with a razor-edged challenge in his gaze. ‘In bed you don’t know how to do anything until I do it first!’
Cheeks as red as ripe strawberries, Ella slung him a furious look. ‘I suppose you think that that kind of crack is funny?’
‘No, I find it highly entertaining that, while most women prefer to minimise the number of their past lovers, you want to claim more,’ he drawled, smooth as silk.
‘Why on earth are you getting undressed?’ Ella demanded abruptly, finally taking notice of that fact.
‘And, in spite of that scarlet past, she still has a mind as pure as driven snow. Haven’t I corrupted you in any way?’ Aristandros mocked, skimming off his boxers in a manoeuvre that soon made it blatantly obvious why he had stripped off.
‘Oh…’ A darting little frisson of sexual heat travelling through her slender length, Ella sank back into the pillows in a manner that might almost have been labelled inviting as he joined her in the bed.
‘Oh…’ Aristandros teased, reclining back and drawing her to him with clear intent. As her slim fingers found the bold, jutting length of his arousal, he emitted a roughened groan of appreciation. ‘Oh yes,’ he growled hungrily. ‘You beat the hell out of a coffee break, khriso mou.’
For a split second, that quip made Ella hesitate, but in truth she found his sexual spontaneity and raw potency as irresistible as she found him. His sensual mouth on hers was like a brand that burned to create a flame that was never quite doused. No matter how much he kissed her, enough was never enough. His tongue thrust between her lips and released a flood of excitement that lit a feverish trail of response through her entire body. He wrenched her nightdress out of his path and closed his lips on a swollen pink nipple.
Sweet sensation gripped her while his knowing mouth travelled between one taut peak and the other, laving and teasing her sensitised flesh until she moaned. With the impatient stroke of his forefinger, he probed the slick, wet welcome at the heart of her before pulling her under him with an unashamed urgency that thrilled her. He plunged into her hard and fast, and her eager body rose to meet his. Excitement was as intense and searing as a fire inside her. He pleasured her with long, forceful strokes, pushing back her knees to gain even deeper penetration. She felt like she had hitched a ride to the stars, and the spellbinding pleasure devoured her. She heard herself cry out and buck under him as breathtaking heat and the waves of ecstasy roared through her. In the sheer power of that sensual conflagration, she was helpless and mindless in her response. He slammed into her one last time with an uninhibited shout of satisfaction.
For a timeless moment she lay under him, rejoicing in his weight, the pound of his heart and the rasp of his breath. At that instant she felt as she often did, overwhelmed by the level of mind-blowing pleasure. But not so overwhelmed by physical sensation that she didn’t enjoy the brush of his mouth against her brow in a salutation, and the tightening of his powerful arms around her in what might almost have been a hug. He didn’t do hugs, but she lived in hope. She loved what he did to her in bed, but she loved the closeness in the aftermath even more, and never, ever stirred a muscle to break their connection before he did.
It was a shock when Aristandros tensed, voiced an unmistakeable Greek curse and pulled back from her in a violent movement that spoke more of rejection than of anything else.
Hard eyes struck her questioning gaze in a near-physical blow. He struck the wooden headboard with a powerful fist, and made her flinch back from him in consternation.
‘What?’ she gasped in bewilderment.
‘I forgot to use a condom,’ Aristandros bit out rawly.
‘Oh…dear,’ was all Ella could think to comment in that unbearably tense moment. The date when she was to start taking the contraceptive pill had not yet arrived, and she had warned him that other precautions would be necessary for the first couple of weeks they were together. Until now he had followed that rule with scrupulous care and had left no margin for error.
Aristandros sprang out of bed like a hungry tiger leaping on prey and swung round to glare at her. ‘Is that all you’ve got to say?’ he demanded icily. ‘I don’t want a child.’
A chill ran through Ella, and she wondered why that statement should feel like a slap in the face when she was equally as keen to avoid the trauma of an unplanned conception. She was frantically working out dates inside her head, which was difficult, as recent changes in her routine appeared to have unsettled her once-regular menstrual cycle. ‘I’m afraid it probably wasn’t the best time to overlook the precautions,’ she admitted ruefully. ‘I could be at my most fertile right now.’
‘I can’t believe I forgot!’ Aristandros grated as if she hadn’t spoken. ‘I’m never careless.’
‘Either of us could be infertile,’ Ella remarked. ‘You’d be surprised how common it is.’
Aristandros gave her a look of outrage and compressed his handsome mouth, as though the suggestion that he might not be able to father a child was a gross insult to his masculinity.
Ella stayed where she was until he had showered and departed. She was in shock, but she also felt that she had just received a much-needed wake-up call. For the past ten days she had been with Aristandros almost round the clock. He got up before six every morning to work with his personal staff. At eight, he joined Ella and Callie for breakfast. If he hadn’t yet reached the stage of being able to totally relax and play with the little girl, he was at least unbending from his rigidity around her, and developing the ability to talk to her and get to know her.
Life on the vast luxury yacht was excessively comfortable and easy. The crew attended to their every need, and very often even before Ella realised that something was required or even available. She was waited on hand and foot and encouraged to be a lady of leisure, with nothing more important to consider than her next visit to the well-equipped beauty salon and its staff on the deck below. It was a lifestyle that could never have come naturally to her, but it gave her the opportunity to spend a great deal of time with Callie. The bond between Ella and her biological child already ran deep and strong. While she would never have chosen to frolic in a swimming pool for her own benefit, she was happy to do so when the purpose was to teach Callie to swim, and the occasions when Aristandros had joined them had proved by far the most entertaining.
‘Sailing home to Greece’ as Ari had termed it, had been more of a leisurely cruise than a straightforward trip between A and B. Hellenic Lady had called in at several islands. Aristandros had taken her out clubbing on Crete, and out to dinner on Corfu. Afterwards they had walked through the narrow streets of the old town hand-in-hand. And who had reached for his hand? Ella clamped cool palms to her agonised face. Hand holding? She felt ill. Just then her mortification was so intense that she honestly wanted to slap herself hard. How could she have been so stupid as to initiate such a foolish
gesture? Romance had nothing to do with their relationship.
She was his mistress—the woman currently meeting the demands of his high-voltage sex drive—not his girlfriend, his fiancée or his wife. And, just as he had wanted, she was always sexually available, and not because she was afraid to be in breach of that outrageous contract that she had signed! No, indeed; the nagging hunger of desire that tormented her had nothing to do with contractual obligations or pride. She couldn’t keep her hands off him, in or out of bed. The need to touch, to connect, was like a fever, a terrible temptation she fought day and night. She was appalled by how attached she had already become to being with Aristandros.
Yet nothing could have more clearly delineated the gulf between them than his reaction to the possibility of her falling pregnant. Somehow he had made her feel like a one-night stand he had picked up, a stranger he barely knew, a female body in which he had no interest once he had sated his most pressing sexual need. If she conceived, he would view it as a disastrous development, and she could only hope that the situation didn’t arise.
Fresh from the shower and with a towel wrapped round her, she was walking back into the state room when Aristandros entered. ‘Did I mention that I’m staging a social gathering at my Athens home this afternoon? No?’ he queried lazily, when she gave him a look of frank dismay. ‘I have some business to tie up with fellow investors and you’ll be acting as my hostess.’
‘Thanks for the last-minute warning!’ Ella gasped.
‘At least you don’t need to worry about booking time in the beauty salon,’ Aristandros quipped.
They flew from the yacht direct to the property. His villa on the Greek mainland was set in an unspoilt area of countryside. Surrounded by olive groves and vineyards, it enjoyed superb views of the mountains. Ella was surprised by the rural setting, for when she had last known Aristandros he and his grandfather had been very firmly rooted in the vast Xenakis townhouse in Athens.
‘Drakon still prefers life in the city, but I like to escape the skyscrapers and the traffic at the end of the day, and here I’m still less than half an hour from the airport,’ Aristandros advanced. ‘I spend a lot of time on the island now. I can work from home, and it’s very private.’
‘It’s beautiful here as well,’ Ella commented, wondering just how many different properties he owned round the world, and even if he knew himself without having to think about it.
‘The pearls look good on you.’
In receipt of that remark, Ella brushed the magnificent necklace at her throat with uneasy fingertips. It was matched by the pearl-drop earrings she wore, and most probably worth a fortune. A slender diamond-studded designer watch also encircled her wrist. She had no idea how much her growing collection of jewellery was worth, since nothing as vulgar as price was ever mentioned when Aristandros insisted on buying her a gift. The previous week an imposingly correct jeweller had flown out to the yacht with a magnificent selection of world-class gems for Ari’s private examination. He had decided on the pearls, which were reputed once to have belonged to an Indian maharajah. Ella had already decided that when she and Aristandros parted she would leave all such unsolicited presents behind her.
Presumably Aristandros was accustomed to rewarding the women in his bed with gifts of extraordinary generosity. But the glorious jewels made her feel more like a trophy piece of arm-candy than ever, and frighteningly deserving of the offensive label her mother had fired at her: Whore. Was that how other people saw her as well—a costly parasite earning a rich reward for pleasing her tycoon lover in bed? She cringed inwardly at the suspicion that she had sunk so low. Ironically, at a moment when she was dressed from head to toe in designer clothing, and sporting fabulous gems, her once-healthy self-esteem was at a very low ebb. She was very much afraid that on Ari’s terms she was just an expensive accoutrement, like a flash car—and, just as he only drove the world’s most expensive cars, he wouldn’t dream of showing off a woman without the spectacular looks, clothing and jewellery that paraded his wealth.
Catering staff already had the food and drinks for the reception organised. The house was immaculate, very contemporary in design, and perfect for large-scale entertainment. A svelte figure in a knee-length plum silk cocktail dress and stiletto heels, Ella joined Aristandros on the outside terrace where drinks were being served just as the first guests arrived. It was not very long before her cheeks were hot with self-consciousness. While everyone was scrupulously polite, it was brutally obvious that she was the focus of a great deal of curiosity. She tormented herself with worries of what stories might already have appeared in the local press about her. Ironically, it was the arrival of Ari’s courteous grandfather, Drakon, which caused her the greatest embarrassment.
‘Ella,’ the dignified older man murmured, stooping to kiss her cheeks in a kindly salute of polished Xenakis charm. ‘Is it rude to admit that, while I am delighted to renew our acquaintance, I very much regret meeting you in these circumstances?’
Lean, strong face broodingly dark and taut, Aristandros answered for her. ‘Yes, it is rude, and quite unnecessary, Drakon. What circumstances?’
The elderly Greek’s shrewd eyes withstood the challenge of his grandson’s grim appraisal. ‘Don’t pretend to be obtuse, Ari,’ he advised drily.
Rigid with mortification, and keen to escape the fallout and any further discussion, Ella was quick to move away to intercept Callie, who was toddling across the room to greet her. Helplessly smiling as the little girl came full tilt into her arms, Ella hugged her. Callie, adorable in a little blue-cotton dress, was as pretty as a picture, and already noticeably more confident and talkative than she had been when Ella had first met her. Callie expressed a desire for the toy rabbit that she took almost everywhere with her, and Ella was taking her back to Kasma to ask where it was when she heard the raised voices sounding from a room off the hall.
Behaving as if there was nothing untoward occurring, the young nurse lifted Callie and took her back upstairs to look for the rabbit.
‘If Callie is Ella’s as you say,’ Drakon Xenakis was thundering in Greek, ‘Give her to Ella and let them both go!’
‘I’m not prepared to let either of them go,’ Aristandros drawled as quietly as if he was in church, his audible calm a striking contrast to his grandfather’s anger. ‘I had a very comprehensive agreement drawn up that suits Ella and I very well—’
‘A legal agreement? Is this what I raised you to do—to corrupt a young woman who only wants access to her own child? Is this what it takes to appeal to your jaded appetites now, Ari? If you had a single streak of decency left, you would marry her, for you’ve destroyed her reputation!’
‘The days when women needed to be whiter than white are long gone, Drakon. Thankfully I live in a world with far more enlightened sexual mores,’ Aristandros retorted bitingly. ‘Whether you believe it or otherwise, Ella is happy with me—’
‘She’s worth more than any of the gold-digging sluts you specialise in, and you’re treating her worse than all of them! The only thing I see in this scenario is revenge, Ari…and it’s ugly and unworthy of you.’
Nausea stirring in her stomach, and her blood running cold in her veins, Ella stumbled away from the partly open door before she could be caught in the act of eavesdropping. Drakon’s opinion hit her as hard as a physical blow, because Ari’s grandfather knew him well, indeed far better than she did. She had been quick to discard the idea of Aristandros acting in revenge—too quick? Certainly she had much preferred to believe that the secret of her ongoing attraction was more her being a femme fatale whom he had never forgotten. But how likely was that interpretation? Was it not more likely that Aristandros was taking revenge for her rejection all those years ago? He had made her walk away from her career, her home and even her principles. He had made her enjoy her captivity in the gilded cage of his life. No; he hadn’t made her do anything, she acknowledged, trying to be honest with herself—she had made the choices she’d had to make to be with
Callie, the daughter of her heart, and to be fair he had kept his promises.
Even so, revenge struck her as the more apt explanation for Ari’s continuing interest in her. Why else would a man who could have the most beautiful women in the world settle for an inexperienced and unsophisticated doctor who was ill at ease with a party lifestyle? He would not have sacrificed his own desires and preferences for Callie’s benefit. In fact, most probably Callie had merely been used as a weapon to put pressure on her biological mother. Having acquired the child, he had also acquired the perfect means to make Ella dance to his chosen tune, and that was exactly what he had done.
In the shaken-up state she was now in, it was the wrong moment for Ella to set eyes on her family for the first time in seven years. Her stepfather, a heavily built man with thick, grey hair, was standing on the terrace with a drink in his hand. Her mother, a slight, fair-haired woman in a pink dress, was by his side. Behind them stood two tall, dark young men—her half-brothers, grown to adulthood without her knowledge. Ella paled when Theo Sardelos looked right through her, and her mother, her face full of painful discomfiture, turned her head quite deliberately to avoid seeing her only surviving daughter. Her twin half-siblings, disdaining such pretences, stared stonily back at her, their scowling attitude one of pure belligerence.
Ella was very angry that Aristandros had put her family on the guest list without telling her. Conscious that she was not the only person present capable of noting that her family was giving her the cold shoulder, she forced herself to address her stepfather with a perfunctory greeting before turning to her mother to say, ‘Would you like to come and see Callie?’
‘No, she would not,’ Theo Sardelos growled, slinging his stepdaughter a look of profound distaste as he answered for his wife, a controlling habit of his that Ella remembered with repulsion. ‘Your presence here makes that impossible.’